Dinosaur Pumpkin Disguise Craft for Kids [Free PDF Template]
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A pumpkin dressed up as a dinosaur is exactly the kind of silly disguise that makes a hide a pumpkin activity fun. This dinosaur pumpkin disguise craft turns the pumpkin into a friendly triceratops with three horns, a big spiky frill, and a dinosaur face. Early elementary aged kids can make one in about 30-45 minutes.
For more fall fun, check out our collection of pumpkin crafts for kids for more fun ways to turn pumpkins into Halloween decorations.
Good To Know
- Themes: Disguise a pumpkin projects
- Activity: Cut and assemble the printable pieces to disguise a pumpkin as a triceratops
- Template: Includes a free printable dinosaur pumpkin disguise template with the pumpkin, frill, horns, face, and stem pieces
- Ages: Early elementary school students
- Time: 30-45 minutes
- Skills: Fine motor skills, scissor skills, gluing, hand-eye coordination, visual discrimination, and spatial awareness
Hide The Pumpkin Idea
For this hide a pumpkin idea, kids are taking the basic pumpkin shape and completely transforming it with dinosaur details. The pumpkin becomes the triceratops face, while the large frill, horns, and snout help hide its original look. They can use traditional dinosaur colors or make the whole thing as bright and unusual as they want.
There’s quite a bit of cutting and layering involved, which gives kids plenty of fine motor practice as they work. Figuring out where the horns, eyes, snout, and frill belong also gets them paying attention to how all the pieces fit together without turning craft time into a lesson.
Once the pieces are cut out, kids can focus on building their pumpkin disguise and making it their own. The simple paper construction makes it easy to change up the colors, so a whole classroom could start with the same pumpkin and end up with a very different group of disguised dinosaurs.
Supplies
- Colored cardstock or construction paper
- Scissors
- Glue
- Markers
- Dinosaur pumpkin template (click the “click here to get your freebies” image at the end of the post)
Directions
Start by printing the template, then gather the materials for this fun activity. Get those scissors ready, and let’s help the kids bring this dinosaur pumpkin to life!
Glue the eyes onto the upper part of the pumpkin, below the eyebrows.
Grab the nose and glue it below and between the eyes. Line it up near the center of the pumpkin to start building the dinosaur’s face.
Take the mouth and let your child color it in with markers. Once they’re done, glue it onto the bottom center of the nose.
Grab the nose horn and glue it above the nose, centered between the eyes.
Glue the two brow horns, placing one above each eyebrow.
Take the stem and glue it to the top center of the pumpkin so it sticks up from behind. This keeps the pumpkin look while it transforms into a dinosaur.
Glue the bony plate spikes around the pointed outer sections of the bony plate, lining each one up with an edge so the tips peek out. This is a great chance for kids to practice matching and careful placement.
Finally, glue the finished pumpkin onto the center of the bony plate, with the bony plate showing around the sides and top.
Who knew disguising a pumpkin could be this much fun? Kids can create their own dinosaur while strengthening fine motor skills, hand-eye coordination, and creativity along the way.
There’s more themed fun waiting below! Pair this project with the related seasonal ideas and Halloween activities to create an engaging lesson plan or activity day.
Halloween Books for Children
Room On The Broom: This has to be one of our favorite Halloween books of all time! The story follows a witch and her cat as they happen upon some animals who help the witch. There’s danger, mystery, and friendship in this adorable children’s story.
The Good, The Bad, And The Spooky: Halloween is the Bad Seed’s favorite holiday, but when he can’t come up with the perfect costume, he decides trick-or-treating should be postponed for everyone! Kids will love following his funny quest to find a show-stopping costume before the big night. With plenty of humor and Halloween fun, this is a great seasonal read for fans of The Bad Seed and the Food Group series.
Ten Timid Ghosts: This is a fun countdown book about a witch who moves into a haunted house where 10 ghosts already live. The witch scares the ghosts out one by one until they devise a scheme to get her out of their house. This Halloween children’s book is good for kids who love rhyming stories!
Fun Halloween Projects
Ghost Disguise Pirate Craft – Apparently this ghost decided a plain white sheet wasn’t enough for Halloween. Kids disguise it with a pirate hat, eye patch, striped shirt, belt, and vest until it looks ready to go searching for treasure instead of haunting anyone.
Candy Corn Mummy Craft – Candy corn colors actually work SO well for a mummy. Kids wrap the body with yellow and cream paper strips, letting them overlap at different angles before adding the face. The uneven bandages are part of what makes this one look good, so there’s no need to make every strip perfect.
Vampire Photo Craft – Putting a child’s own face on the vampire makes this one much funnier than a regular paper character. Brads give the arms and legs movement, and kids even get to draw the vampire hair directly onto their photo before putting everything together.
Zombie Paper Cup Craft – A paper cup makes a surprisingly good zombie body. Kids add the green head, exposed brain, arms, and patched clothing, then draw on extra skin spots and stitches with markers. He looks appropriately spooky without being creepy.
October Worksheets
Connecting dots is already satisfying, but watching a Halloween character slowly appear makes these Halloween dot to dot printables even better. Kids follow the numbers to reveal pictures like a ghost, black cat, or pumpkin, then get to color the finished design.
With these bat color by numbers, kids aren’t coloring the same bat over and over again. The set includes different bat poses, including a sleeping bat and one hanging upside down, and the number guides tell kids how to fill in each section.
The werewolf page in these Halloween worksheets is such a fun change from ordinary handwriting practice. Kids cut out words and match them to parts of the werewolf, while other pages have them trace Hh or work through an H-themed letter maze.
Bring some spooky season fun to learning with this set of Halloween theme printables! Preschool, Pre-K, and kindergarten children can practice letter recognition, pattern recognition, handwriting, counting, and fine motor skills through a variety of Halloween themed activities.
The different pages will encourage kids to trace, match, count, and think carefully while exploring festive characters and pictures. It’s a fun way to add seasonal learning to lessons in the classroom or home, morning work, or October activities.
Share With Us
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For a chance to have your child’s project featured, simply snap a picture of the completed project and post it to our Facebook page, email it to us directly by clicking here, or use #simpleeverydaymom on your social media!
Dinosaur Pumpkin Craft
Video
Materials
- Colored cardstock or construction paper
- Scissors
- Glue
- Markers
- Dinosaur pumpkin template
Instructions
- Print the template and gather the materials for this fun activity.
- Begin by gluing the eye pieces onto the upper part of the pumpkin, below the eyebrows.
- Glue the nose below and between the eyes.
- Let your child color in the mouth with markers and glue it onto the bottom center of the nose.
- Glue the nose horn above the nose, centered between the eyes.
- Glue the two brow horns on, placing one above each eyebrow.
- Grab the stem and glue it onto the top and back of the pumpkin.
- Look for bony plate spikes and glue them around the pointed outer sections of the bony plate.
- Finally, glue the completed pumpkin onto the center of the bony plate.
Did you make this?
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Free Dinosaur Pumpkin Template
Meet Sam
Sam is the crafter and founder of Simple Everyday Mom. She has been featured in Oprah Mag, Good Housekeeping, The Spruce Crafts, Country Living, The Bump, and more.
